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What are some highly praised comedians you don't find very funny?
This is a post to express opinions about comedy and comedians. I am curious about everyone's taste in comedy. This is not a post to covertly express bigoted views about comedians of a specific race or gender. Other than that, everything is allowed!
I gotta say it even tho I’m likely to catch heat for this.
Dave Chappelle has really lost what made him funny in the first place. For What It’s Worth and Killing Them Softly are some of the funniest videos I have ever seen, some classic jokes. But I gotta say all his Netflix stuff is completely forgettable.
He really did become his own joke. He did a bit about how people care too much about what celebrities think, the famous “let’s see what ja rule thinks”. In that joke he basically says stop listening to famous people cause they don’t know shit. Fast forward to now and all he does is tell people what he thinks about certain issues and I’m like why are you telling me this shit? you’re a comedian not a philosopher.
I won’t bring up the trans issue with Dave cause that’s been the main complaint against him for a while now. That is an issue but may need more time to unpack. I just don’t know what happened that turned him into a parody of himself, that he created in the first place.
I'm not a Chapelle super fan, but I was someone that liked his show back in the day. I think in many ways he didn't change. And that's the problem. He was, for his own good reasons, out of the game for a long time and came back and didn't really change - didn't learn and understand why trans folks were being harmed by his words, didn't grow his comedy the way others did over the same time. He just froze in time. And that makes him stand out as the out of touch "parody" he feels like.
So I think his jokes about trans people were in poor taste, and his reaction to the backlash (taking photos with MTG???) confirms to me that he really is transphobic. But he has a point he likes to make about how trans rights seem to have taken over the progressive agenda with more force than racial justice has in decades. Gay rights were the focus for years, now it’s trans rights. And I agree that it really does seem like the issues with race in America are taking a back seat to newer, shinier issues.
I'm not American so I can't speak for American discourse, but one point about this that I have seen is that there are also PoC who are LGBT+, but Chappelle completely ignores them. He seemingly only talks about white LGBT+ people who are apples to oranges in comparison to cisgender and hetero black people.
Transgender black women exist and they have a lot more struggles in life than a cisgender heterosexual black man. Not that it's a competition about oppression although he seems to want to make it one.
99.9% of LGBT+ communities are intersectional. I mean just look at the new pride flag which was specifically designed to be as inclusive as possible. I don't think it's true to say that it has overtaken the progressive agenda, or it would at least be a very subjective opinion that it has - and besides, how is Chappelle not by most definitions conservative? As I see it, it's more like it has just been included in the progressive agenda. You can fight for more than one cause at once but it's true that some people want it to be exclusive.
Huey P. Newton of the Black Panthers said this in 1970:
It's not a zero sum game and trans folks and rights are not at odds with black folks and rights. Laws are being actively passed and trans folks are being demonized. Black trans folks are at some of the highest risks of being murdered. Anti-racism efforts have been stymied to the point that DEI is banned in multiple higher ed institutions. This is all bad.
I will agree that white liberals tend to avoid really engaging with racial justice - but they're not really grappling with queer theory either. They're doing some bare minimum "maybe we shouldn't take healthcare away from trans kids." But they're also doing "maybe we should reform bail" and "student loan forgiveness" and "feed kids in the summer." The supreme Court has made them take big losses on affirmative action and reproductive rights.
If people are only hearing about trans topics they're either deep in queer media (and somehow not also getting topics on policing, hate crimes in general, racism, etc.) or they're drinking from the absolute hydrant of right wing anti-trans media (which absolutely includes the NYT and other "liberal" sources)
I agree with you. I watched all his specials and at some point he became more concerned with being a TERF than with making jokes. A lot of his set now is just David Chappelle stating opinions that barely qualify as jokes anymore.
This is the Wikipedia definition of "TERF:"
"Gender-critical feminism, known to its opponents as trans-exclusionary radical feminism, TERF ideology or TERFism, is an ideology or movement that opposes what it refers to as "gender ideology": the concept of gender identity and transgender rights, especially gender self-identification. Gender-critical feminists believe that sex is biological and immutable, while believing gender, including both gender identity and gender roles, to be inherently oppressive. They reject the concept of transgender identities. These views have been described as transphobic by feminist and scholarly critics, and are opposed by many feminist and LGBT rights organizations. Originating as a fringe movement within feminism in the United States, gender-critical views have achieved a degree of prominence in the United Kingdom, where they have been at the centre of a number of high-profile controversies."
Is there something Chapelle has said that invokes such ideological stances? I've heard him say a lot that ruffles trans and trans ally feathers, but I don't think I've ever heard him align himself with this definition of TERF.
Yes. He literally stated, on his special, in no uncertain terms and for all to hear, that he is a TERF.
And yes, he made numerous other transphobic statements that you can easily find with a little research.
I don't see the point of duelling in technicalities though, you can swap "TERF" for "transphobic" if you think that makes more sense.
I'd like to ask for your perspective on which joke, specifically, was TERF commentary. I've watched the specials numerous times and can't think of anything that stood against the trans movement, so I'm curious what I missed. I have read quite a few articles during the outrage, but also found they explicitly ignored his statements of ally-ship and seemed to only want to repeat the words that sounded transphobic without any other context. This is me engaging you in discussion, not toxic negativity, which you yourself said you thought Tildes was capable of doing.
I am asking for you insight, because "They reject the concept of transgender identities" is the opposite of what I heard Dave express, repeatedly.
I watched every single of his specials, I'm a fan. But I have no way to go back to each special and find the exact quotes and timecodes for you at the moment. I don't even have Netflix anymore. Sorry :/
This is basically my take as well.
There is a very specific quote "I'm team TERF" which he 100% does say in one of his specials (I think the most recent to my memory), but the context to that quote matters, as does his actual views and behaviors. It's a complex subject that often gets reduced to something dumb.
You act as if he's being taken completely out of context, but he's really not. And IMO in context it's actually even worse. He literally says he agrees with the TERF position, echoing the TERF talking points about "gender is a fact", and even compares transgender women to black face. From a previous comment of mine on the issue, here's the full Chappelle quote from the special:
cc: @BusAlderaan, that whole ~lgbt topic I linked to, especially kfwyre's exemplary comments, is worth reading if you want to see some LGBT+ users' perspectives on the Chappelle transphobia issue.
p.s. Related, here's an excellent point about "edgy" comics by Anthony Jeselnik, and another by James Acaster.
That James Acaster bit was great, thanks for sharing. James Acaster is one of my fav contestants on WILTY / 8 out of 10 cats. His stories are always so crazy.
I haven't read the full thread, but read the top link and yours, wanted to reply now and I'll go back later and read the rest of the thread, thank you for sharing it.
I guess, even reading his truly ignorant interpretation of the treatment of JK Rowling, I still just see a man who's obviously got a complex relationship with the issue of transgenderism, but is trying to be an ally to his best ability. Like a dad who says all the wrong things, but is literally trying to do his best. We don't have to just accept the person where they are and not require growth from them, but why have we resorted to this ideology that if someone doesn't fully, 100%, cross over the demarcation line, then they're anti everything we stand for? You can be for trans people and still ignorantly land in hot water, you don't have to just automatically become anti trans people, you can just be a flawed human. Humans don't just change, that's never, ever, ever, been how we work. Have you seen Dave Chapelle comedy from the 90's and 00's? That man has grown, undoubtedly. My interpretation is that he jokes about trans people because they're a hot topic, which many comedians make their content about and because, and I whole heartedly believe he is documented as saying as much, he thinks the more you joke about something, the less charged it becomes. He's one of those "If we just all joked about this really tense thing and laughed about the humorous aspects about it, we could find a little common ground." I don't 100% agree with that concept, but he clearly does, from what I've seen.
I fall squarely in the "The person being made the butt of a joke gets to decide if it's ok or not," so I'm not actually arguing that trans people are just wrong, because I don't get to decide that. But I am asking if we're throwing the baby out with the bathwater, as emotional humans are well documented to have done throughout history. Why can't a comedian make a joke about the fact that there is a quantifiable difference between a M2F vagina and a homegrown one? Comedians find the funny in any group or person and poke at it, like it or not. I don't personally like making people the butt of my jokes, I don't like how it feels to see them hurt, but comedy in general clearly doesn't agree with my sentiments. So why shouldn't a comedian make jokes about trans people or gay people or black people, if the end goal is equality.
This all might seem all over the place, I have very complex feelings and thoughts about it, which I think just speaks to how NOT black and white this issue is and why we should be able to talk and joke about it openly. I don't know how to solve for the fact that the butt of his jokes are hurt by them, I can't square that round hole.
IMO the major problem with your take on all this is that, unlike your ignorant but well-meaning ally dad example, I genuinely don't think that Dave Chappelle actually is an ally to the trans community. Chappelle also clearly doesn't want to learn from his mistakes, since he has repeatedly just doubled down on his ignorant jokes about trans people, and the "woe is me", "I'm the real victim here", "cancel culture!" bullshit ever since the first controversy.
As for joking about trans people, you absolutely can. There are a number of LGBT+ and genuine ally comedians who regularly make fun of LGBT+ issues, including trans issues. But the difference between them and Chappelle is they're not helping to spread ignorant views to millions of viewers, giving more ammunition to hateful bigots, nor do their jokes have an undercurrent of disgust like Chappelle's do.
Chappelle also clearly gets off on pissing people off with his trans jokes these days. And as Jeselnik said in the video I linked to above, "art is getting away with it", and if all a comedian ends up doing is making people angry with their "jokes", then they failed at their job as a comedian, and they are nothing more than a troll.
Yes. I was a massive fan of Chappelle for decades, ever since his first appearance on Def Comedy Jam in the early 90s. Stand-up comedy is and always has been a huge part of my life, and I've seen almost all of his televised comedy appearances, all his specials (except the latest two because I refuse to support him anymore), and have even rewatched every episode of Chappelle's Show countless times.
Chappelle used to push boundaries in a truly insightful way. However, now I feel like he's just an ignorant troll hiding his true feelings about trans people behind his "jokes" about them, and I deal with enough of those kind of assholes in my real life, so I have no interest in watching someone I once respected do the same on stage. Which is why I am no longer a fan of his. Well, that and I honestly can't stand his new "old, out-of-touch man rambles pointlessly for ages" schtick. You say he has grown, and that's true in some respects, but clearly not when it comes to trans issues, which he is still monumentally and willfully ignorant on.
If he really wants to be an ally, maybe he should listen to all the trans people begging him to stop making fun of them in the way that he is, which is only making things worse, not better. An ally doesn't consistently make things worse for a marginalized group, and double down on that when called out by members of that group. They listen, and they learn from their mistakes. That's what allyship is about. Chappelle refuses to do either.
p.s. "Transgenderism" is an incredibly outdated medical term, and considered derogatory nowadays, in case you weren't aware.
It's really not that complex and this is not one of those cases of quotes taken out of context. I used to love the man and watched every single thing he put out for years. He was, and probably still is, overwhelmingly clear in his transphobia even in the context of a comedy special. And I'm talking as someone that would have every reason to deny this since I would love to still be able to enjoy his comedy.
I think he is indisputably one of the most talented comedians ever. And he can be very insightful when it comes to issues he has actually lived through. Like racism. But ever since his Netflix deal he has developed wealth-brain, that is, thinking that his success in one area implies innate wisdom in all areas. Thus leads to him being very sensitive to any criticism or ideas outside his understanding as we have seen with his anti trans material.
Robin Williams.
I thought his standup comedy was too random and fast to be funny. He would just say 1,000 things quickly and I guess people would get surprised and laugh or something. I guess I don't think randomness is funny and he tended to lean on certain tropes that he would repeat a lot.
Also I didn't like his first few movies, for example "Good Morning Vietnam" and the Genie bits in Aladdin for the same reasons.
On the other hand he was quite a good actor in several movies where he didn't do the manic random humor thing. And in a few interviews with Conan or Craig Ferguson I thought he was a good and wholesome guest. Apparently he was also a great person in real life and I understand the sadness that the world felt when he passed away.
Nice, there’s a hot take.
I have no intention to convince you to love Robin Williams, but I would argue that he never really did stand up. I mean, he was sometimes standing up in front of an audience, but he always did impressions, improv, character work, or just random comedy that was hard to classify, regardless of what was advertised.
I have this conversation with my husband every time he tries to show me a video of Robin Williams doing stand-up or on a late-night talk show. I just cannot handle the fire hose of stuff he blasts, even though I can tell there’s talent there.
I have the same reaction to his stuff as you and /u/hobbes64. “Fire hose” is a good way to put it. And yeah, he was clearly talented. I could handle him either in small doses or in films where he turned the manic energy way down.
He wore a beard for his good stuff.
I feel a bit bad about bringing this up, but... Amy Schumer. Very successful career, but I'm aware there's a vocal minority on the internet that thinks she's the worst comedian ever and has never told an actually funny joke that wasn't stolen from a better comedian, etc etc. And then the conversation inevitably turns towards misogyny, and this vocal minority gets accused of simply gatekeeping all women from being funny. I'm not one of those people who thinks she's the worst, but I do find her fairly... not funny. Not because I don't think women can be funny (as an example of a female comedian I like, I enjoy Taylor Tomlinson's work). I just don't vibe with it.
I know Schumer has done a lot more than just standup in her career, but talking specifically about her standup, I just find it a bit bland, uninspired and one-note. I don't know if she actually "stole" jokes, but to be honest I don't think comedy needs to be fundamentally original to be funny.
Most good jokes are echoes of older jokes. It's all in the execution. Occasionally there comes along someone who brings something fresh, but a lot of it is just bringing something that already existed into the limelight. George Carlin didn't invent swearing, or dark humor, he just brought it out of the pub and onto the stage. Jerry Seinfeld didn't invent observational humor - looking at something in the environment around you and going "you know that's kinda weird when you think about it" is probably the oldest form of humor there is. It's all in the execution. And I don't think Amy Schumer's execution is particularly good. It's like you heard one joke and you've heard all of them. Maybe it was funny the first time, but it isn't still funny when you're doing the same thing over and over again over the course of a decade.
(Not to trivialize e.g. Carlin's legal battles, my point wasn't to say some comedians don't take risks, but rather that they aren't inventing entirely new forms of humor. And that I don't think that's necessary to be a great comedian.)
I think Schumer has a good sense of humour, but I don't think she's very consistant with how funny her work tends to be. She had me rolling on the floor laughing one time for a joke I had long forgotten. I don't think I've ever seen her do something I would classify as "unfunny" but some come close.
Comedy is something that you need a degree of understanding of the context to properly grasp. You might have heard about the Babylon Bee, for instance, and thought it was boring or misanthropic. But to it's readers it's putting out banger after banger. It's not that it's inherantly unfunny insomuch as you lack the perspective required for the joke to have it's effect. When King of the Hill first aired I thought it was really dry and oddly paced. But then when I realized that it was making fun of people whom I was intimately familliar with it became the funniest show ever. I suspect Amy Schumer is much the same.
I don't know if I can subscribe to the "there is no bad art, only misunderstood art" philosophy. I think you can definitively say something is bad in quality; movie, article, standup, painting etc. while not being the target audience. There are things that I enjoy that I know are qualitatively bad, even with context.
Amy Schumer is chronically unfunny as a stand-up. Never saw her TV show. There's nothing very complex about her terrible comedy, it's just not funny at all. But the reactions to her do seem over the top. I don't see anyone rallying against Kevin Hart, who's probably even worse than her.
who, unironically, just recently won the Mark Twain award for humor or whatever. I really dislike Kevin Hart, and I don't understand why so many find him entertaining.
I think he's got a particular dynamic that resonates well with me comedically, particularly because I knew a few men (acquaintances, thankfully) where they did lean into that "angry about being short, but also with jokes" kinda vibe that he picked up after time. His old stand ups have more variety than that.
Have you seen Jumanji (2017)? He works well against The Rock by having character and personality, and Jack Black is a blast in that.
I think Kevin Hart does well at playing that yin/yang contrast of the Buddy Cop genre (and spins on it).
Not a fan of him on his own, generally.
I haven't seen the new Jumanji, but I am not surprised he did well in that. He's got a "short Chris Tucker" vibe that makes sense in that kind of movie.
That's crazy!!!!! :P
I remember really disliking her stand-up specials that I saw. However, I absolutely loved her movie Trainwreck as well as the cooking show she did with her husband during lockdown. There's probably something about her on-stage persona that rubs people the wrong way - myself included - but I don't particularly care to go back and rewatch the stand-up to figure out exactly what it is.
I distrust my own feelings on that, somewhat. Seemed to me she was one of the more consistent targets of the Russian troll farms back when they were experimenting and warming up to their serious political interference. For whatever reason it got to the point (on reddit at least) where everybody thought everybody else thought she was beneath contempt, and that sort of thing has an effect on us people who are sure their opinions are fully their own. Some of it may have been marginally on point, but it was mixed in with quite a bit of sexism and fat shaming and just overall playground assholery.
Personally I've given her some compensatory benefit-of-doubt, if that makes sense, and can say I have no problem with her persona, her humor, any of it.
I greatly enjoyed her skit show Inside Amy when it was airing on Comedy Central. I'm not sure if I ever watched her past stand-up, I watched a recent one and I thought it was "meh." Not terrible but not compelling either.
Lewis CK. All of his sets sounded like some mildly conservative dude coming onto the stage and complaining about modern life. His sex jokes were especially painful, and he just appeared to have no real energy behind most of his performances, only ever getting excited when it came to the worst bits in his sets. I could not ever understand his appeal.
I gotta be honest with you, I thought he was brilliant. But after the whole masturbation thing I can't stand to even look at his face anymore. And if you look at his current persona, it really feels like he is doubling down on his own shit. It's sad.
Many of his bits about growing old were great. I don't disagree about not wanting to consume his content anymore.
Here's the shitty ankle bit with some random YT guy acting it out over the voice. With a shitty knee, I can't not relate.
CK is a comedy genius and always will be. Unfortunately, I simply cannot digest his current persona.
Also, whatta fuck am I watching? Is that a fusion between Joe Rogan and Louis CK? lol
Couldn't agree more. I was also a fan and found his jokes, delivery, and how he went weird places and took the audience along with him kind of revelatory.
But in hindsight, the masturbation jokes take on a wholly different light when you know the truth, in that they weren't actually jokes but more slices of his real life. Not so funny when he's using his position of power to force women to put up with his fetish.
Also, when that all came out he wasn't even peaking, career-wise. I watched Horace and Pete and was completely blown away by it. It was basically a play performed for cameras. It wasn't really funny, even. Just very, very well done. He was still on a meteoric rise, then crashed hard.
I actually really liked him, at least some of his material.
I'm a little bit conflicted about his masturbation scandal. I think a lot of the dialog was coming at that from a kink shaming perspective, with people calling it "gross". And while what he did is definitely not my cup of tea, the only issue I see is with who he is relative to who he involved in his... personal activities, which created a power imbalance.
I generally dislike kink shaming too, but I'm not conflicted at all in CKs case. I don't think anyone would have cared if he just enjoyed masturbating in front of his partners with their fully informed consent. But whipping your dick out and beating off to completion in front of (or over the phone when talking to) employees and coworkers in a professional setting, even when supposedly with "consent"1 (which is problematic due to the huge power imbalance as their boss and the star of the show), is pretty fucked up and absolutely should be shamed. That's sexual coercion/harassment at the very least, and potentially even sexual assault.
1 - Air quotes also because he would allegedly ask if he could beat off in front of women in a seemingly joking manner, and when the women (many of whom were also comedians) jokingly replied affirmatively, he would then actually whip his dick out for real... which isn't informed consent, it's a bait and switch.
p.s. Even the "consent" part may not actually even be true. See:
Counterpoint: I didn’t consent to Louis C.K. masturbating in front of me
I assumed that was part of the bit. Like an edgy Colbert or something. Very nihilistic humor. With the sexual abuse though the veil was pierced and I can't stand him either.
I really liked him when I was a teen. Especially his show Louie I was really in love with.
But yeah thinking back a lot of his specials didn't age well. Even aside from the gross masturbation stuff; I'm thinking back to his bit where he argued that everyone should be allowed to say the n-word... definitely wouldn't fly anymore these days...
This is going to be a minority opinion, but: All standup comedians.
I find this comedy format to inherently feel forced and awkward. It reminds me of uncomfortable dates I went on when I was in my late teens and early 20s, where my date would try to impress me by trying to be funny at me: telling canned jokes, doing voices, etc., while I just sat there and tried to look entertained instead of embarrassed.
Comedy only feels natural and unforced to me when it is interactive: improv, skits, joking around with a friend, etc. Humor is a thing you share with someone, not something you do at someone. But even solo comedy can work (a la Mr. Bean), so long as there is not this awkward captive audience problem.
I get the impression you didn't watch a lot of stand-up because a lot of them don't really follow the pattern you describe. And I fail to see how skits are any more interactive than stand-up, they are just as scripted. But hey, it's a genuine opinion so take my upvote ;)
It's true that I don't watch much standup because I don't like the format (just as I would expect someone who finds musicals awkward and forced to not watch many musicals).
However, friends trying to get me to like standup have introduced me to a lot of widely celebrated routines by very famous and well-loved standup comedians, and while some of the individual jokes they make are very clever and would be very funny to me in a different context, watching the whole routine through triggers my cringe response. It's just... too weird and unnatural for me. It too effectively echoes the awkward experiences I've had with people trying to entertain at me, instead of interacting with me like a normal human being.
Scripted comedy (skits, movies, plays, etc.) don't bother me because they almost never depict someone being funny at someone else. They typically depict 2+ people interacting together; even if only one of them is being funny, the other(s) aren't just passive subjects laughing on cue—they are acting and reacting as well.
The best standup comedy routines have an ebb and a flow to them, and the jokes are a part of a bigger whole.
A very consistent theme is to callback to previous jokes, and the finale, if well executed, is a all-encompassing punchline. It's part of why taking individual jokes out of context can really paint things in a different light.
I'd tenatively reccomend watching The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, where the standup is a prominant, but not dominate, part of a well-done period comedy-drama.
That sounds highly specific, but I respect your point of view.
You might enjoy seeing standups doing crowd work, which you rarely get in their taped specials.
I enjoy that for my favorites because I've already seen all their prepared material, so it's something extra from them. But it is also very interactive.
Taylor Tomlinson and Ben Brainard are two that have a fair amount of extra live content on Youtube. It is also a big part of all of Sarah Millican's sets.
Jimmy Carr's specials feature a ton of crowd-work too. E.g. Jimmy Roasting The Audience - Vol. 1, Vol. 2 Vol. 3, 25 Times Jimmy Carr Rinsed a Heckler!
And another favorite comedian of mine, Matteo Lane, has also released two "Advice Specials" [1] [2] that are entirely based on audience interaction, and IMO are hilarious, as well.
cc: @RoyalHenOil, since you might enjoy those.
Yes. I wouldn't recommend Jimmy Carr to someone who already thinks standup is too stiff and artificial, though. Even he admits that he looks and moves like a ventriloquist dummy :P
LOL, yeah, his actual scripted stand-up routines might not be RHO's cup of tea, but the audience roasting / heckler interaction parts of his specials might be, which makes up a lot of them. Especially since Carr even actively encourages heckling at his shows because of how insanely good he is at turning the tables on them.
I love Jimmy Carr. I love how he is so unabashedly old-fashioned, telling joke after joke like in the old days, setup - punchline, setup - punchline, setup - punchline... At the same time, he injects a level of sophistication and ingenuity into these old tropes that not everyone will notice. As you say, he is a master of improvisation, crowd work, and "heckling management" (even though it is very clear to me that most of the time he's just handling a huge deck of jokes on the back of his mind, carefully and quickly choosing the one to use at any given time...).
Thanks for the recs. I watched a little of Matteo Lane. It's pretty funny! I have watched Jimmy Carr's stuff in the past, but either he is actually a jerk or he cultivates a jerk persona, and I find that pretty offputting.
I think you are right; I probably would like that much better. I definitely do enjoy comedy bands, despite them kind of entertaining at the audience, because they tend to be more interactive with the audience and each other.
Some of the lesser known comedians who post on reddit (yeah, I know...) are pretty good. Many are not as good, so you kind of have to wade through the mess to find the good stuff, but still.
Is it just filmed stand-up specials you don't like? Or live ones too?
I definitely get it with almost all stand-up specials, they're all shot really in a weird stilted way, and the comedian has usually polished the routine for the hour so much that it feels robotic. I came across this video essay a while ago that touches on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjH8oztEiPI
I think stand-up CDs (if new ones of those even come out) fare better, since there's no artificiality injected from filming it -- it's the same routine they do at any of their shows, but this time recorded from a soundboard.
I used to watch more stand-up comedy, but at some point I stopped entirely. Podcasts replaced it and feels so much better to me. Same comedians, same humour, even sometimes the same jokes, but told in a conversational style where there's more intimacy and improve and thoughts coming off the cuff instead of workshopped. I've gone to the Comedy Cellar in-person a few times and that's also been pretty good and less stilted, I think mainly because the comedians only have 5 or 10 minutes for their sets, so its a combo of whatever jokes they think will work on the audience, and some impromptu crowd-work, and figuring out what works in the room, instead of being honed and rehearsed.
You might want to check out Mateo Lane's Advice specials on YouTube. AFAIK it's all improvised it's made me laugh myself to tears.
Tig Notaro
Disclaimer: I'm sure her actual stand-up is good, I haven't watched any of it, I know she's had some well received intimate stuff with her cancer and such, and I'm sure she's great in that medium and will not dispute that.
But outside of that I am so cold on her. I used to listen to Professor Blastoff way back in the day too and liked it, so I'm not all against her, she also used to have good runs on Comedy Bang Bang.
But now when I know she's in something I know I won't enjoy it, she only has one comedic voice: Tig Notaro, and the whole Tig Notaro personality, and for me that means a cold deadpan disengaged energy that runs counter to the mood of whatever show she's on. If she's acting in something she won't really be acting, she'll be her same wooden disengaged personality.
Her on her own in something? Fine, I'm sure. Her engaging in anything else with people I like? Big mood killer. I can appreciate people liking her standup, but I don't get why people clamour to see her in anything else.
Tig Notaro's stand-up is a bit like the comedy of Trevor Noah, Hannah Gadsby, and Jerrod Carmichael: you don't laugh because it is funny, you laugh because you feel that laughing is the right thing to do. It's like an amusing TED talk.
That sounds... I hate using this word, but... cringe? Painful? Like, I wonder why would someone want to do that? I watch comedians because I want to genuinely laugh, not because I want to feel compelled to laugh awkwardly because I feel laughing "should" be happening.
I find all of those performers, except Jerrod Michael who I'm not familiar with, to have genuinely funny moments surrounded by other moments that are thoughtful, poignant and sometimes upsetting. The fairly rapid tone shifts enhance the funny parts for me, and I often feel that I come away from their work with a new perspective. I never feel compelled to laugh at them, but I also don't laugh for a lot of the show.
See and I find Trevor Noah entirely hilarious and I enjoy Hannah Gatsby generally even though the point of those shows isn't always to laugh. I mean it is, but they play with tension in a fun way.
Well, that is just my opinion. I'm sure there are people who find them genuinely funny.
I know, I appreciated your ideas on the matter. I am curious what a fan finds interesting in Tig's comedy, she clearly has an audience. I tried watching one of her stand-ups, it was meh, I didn't finish it. There were a few funny parts (one joke in particular where she talked about how she worked at a temp agency and her manager asked what she normally does for work and Tig answered that she's a comedian got a genuine laugh out of me), but it mostly felt like a drag.
So here's my "hot take": if the intended effect of your act is not overwhelmingly comedic in nature, you shouldn't sell it as a comedy.
That doesn't mean I think these shows are bad, and that doesn't mean I think their message is unimportant or unworthy to be heard. I just think comedy should be funny. If much of your show is composed of philosophical observations about life, if your third act is a speech about the time you were sexually abused, and if your "jokes" are not really meant to evoke a comedic emotion in the audience, then congratulations: you're a monologist.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with giving speeches or telling your life story. Billy Crystal: 700 Sundays is one of the most beautiful things I've seen. But it's not stand-up.
So, in that spirit, Jerrod Carmichael and Hannah Gadsby strike me as smart, passionate, interesting, insightful, and cool. But I do not find them funny. Some of their work would be more appreciated as monologues than comedy.
Joe Pera
I get that it's his shtick, but it just doesn't connect with me in any way. I find the slow pace frustrating and the persona way too affected and ridiculous.
I suppose I like comedy that feels either way over the top or believable and relatable and Pera is neither.
Yeah he's not and never has been "hilarious". Just mildly entertaining at best. Only think I like is sometimes you just laugh after the whole experience is over purely because it was just so different.
Maybe without naming names....I don't find a particular kind of jokes funny: gross jokes.
Bodies are funny, sure, and humans do funny things. I just would rather hear different types of jokes.
Might not really be properly answering the question but I thought Hannah Gadsby's latest special was kind of boring. The first one I saw had so much emotion, and I think what worked was the contrast between talking about trauma and then jokes. It was quite the experience to watch that. But her latest one was just stuff about her marriage which was kind of silly, but never all that funny.
Super specific one: Adam Sandler's music. This one is fresh in my mind because my kids are watching Leo right now and he's singing.
All of my friends in the 90's bought his album, and I've heard him singing in quite a few of his movies and it's always just terrible. Like he's making it up on the spot, and not in a genius songwriter sort of way.
Otherwise I love a lot of his work, comedy or otherwise. Just can't stand the singing.
Oh yeah, a lot of times he makes himself sound worse for comedy. But his regular singing voice is just kind of okay. Nothing much, but not terrible either.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tp2qkhHU0Mw
Yeah, I've got nothing against him. He's made some great movies (and some not so great), and I always recite this scene when giving my kids baths. :D
I just find it baffling that so many latched on to his singing... like it seems like that part of his bit should have just naturally faded away in favor of the things he does better.
Thanks for sharing the video. That was a great tribute to Chris Farley. ♥
Sandler used to sing songs on SNL -- sometimes on Weekend Update. It was funny in context. I don't know if they were album-worthy, but they were enjoyable as a component of a comedy skit.
And yeah that tribute was quite beautiful, even though I didn't really know much about Farley at the time. It's a song about friendship, we can all relate to that!
Norm McDonald.
I see people praising him and extolling his amazing skill and genius and I just don't get it. I get what he's going for, but I think it only rarely works.
I'm more inclined to dislike Sean Lock for his overtly sexist takes. For example this video is doing the rounds again on the internet.
It almost feels hard to watch knowing that the woman in question is being so heavily objectified it feels heartbreaking, even despite her being there for looking pretty and even if she is wholly okay with that.
I'm guessing you don't know much about the UK comedy scene?
The "challenging wank" thing isn't a joke about her being attractive, it's a joke about how there's people that actually do act like that, and he's making fun of them.
Also, he just leaves it at the single line. He doesn't keep going with it. He acknowledged that it's over the line by his reaction afterwards, but is basically saying "the joke was too good to pass up".
It's pretty out of character for Sean Lock, which is another part of what makes it funny.
I do know QI and the like being dutch myself. Seen quite a lot if it and generally like it the sense of humor. Maybe it was out of context. And if so I don't mean any negativity towards Sean Lock as a person. It just struck me a little demeaning towards women.
Also, you may not realise he actually died a couple of years ago.
oh, I'm sorry to hear that.. hmm.. shame on me for not doing a little bit more digging.
May I suggest you change the title of the post to comedians we do find funny if you really want to simply discuss comedy and everyone’s taste. Or perhaps you could ask what lesser known comedians people enjoy.
As it stands the question is inviting the type of negativity that I think many on tildes came here to avoid. Let people enjoy what they enjoy and let’s focus on the positives in life!
On that note I think my favorite form of comedy is TV - I have been going back through the show New Girl and I have been finding it almost as hilarious the second time through. The first season or two definitely have some cringey moments that have gotten cringier with time and it’s kind of funny to see the early 2010’s twee obsession slowly dampen out as the title sequence shortens and then gets replaced by electric guitars in subsequent seasons. But the interactions between the core group of actors holds up as absolute gold if you enjoy feel-good buddy-comedy at all.
I'm not really interested in a list of beloved comedians. I trust Tildes to be capable of making negative statements without embracing toxic negativity ;)